Yakima jury hears case: Does strip club permit denial warrant damages?
shadowcat
Atlanta suburb
YAKIMA, Wash. — Jamie Muffett is an experienced family businessman entitled to recover losses he suffered when the city of Yakima improperly denied him a business license to operate a strip club on South First Street, his attorney argued Monday in U.S. District Court.
"We're going to be showing you what he's entitled to and ask you for relief," his attorney, Kristin Olson of Bellevue, told six jurors.
But attorneys representing the city said that Muffett lacked proof of any losses related to any loss of business spanning the time he could have been in operation and that the jury should only award fees he incurred while pursuing the business proposal.
"And not a cent more," attorney Ken Harper told the jury selected Monday morning. "The question in this case is going to focus on how to prove lost profits for a business that didn't even exist."
Muffett's unspecified damages in the civil lawsuit against the city include profits he estimates his business would have earned. Jurors are expected to render a verdict today in the two-day trial.
Muffett sought to open Sinsations Gentlemen's Club at 2308 S. First St. in 2010. But the city denied him a license, saying such a business wouldn't be compatible in the area even though it met zoning requirements.
Earlier this month, Judge Rosanna Malouf Peterson, chief judge for the federal court in Eastern Washington, ruled that Muffett's civil rights had been violated, and that the city needs to be more clear in determining why an adult business wouldn't be compatible in a given area.
In response to the ruling, the city enacted a six-month moratorium on processing applications for adult businesses. That moratorium will be the subject of an Aug. 21 City Council public hearing.
Olson said Muffett lost roughly $8,000 in rent he paid to the owner of the building where he planned to open the business in addition to permit costs paid to the city and attorney fees. "He wouldn't of paid nearly $10,000 if he knew the city was going to say, ‘no you can't open there,' " she said.
Olson focused on Muffett's experience working for his family's Zillah-based irrigation, construction and fencing companies to portray him as a successful businessman with an accurate understanding of the earning potential of his proposed strip club. Muffet also owns and operates the Tuscan Sands nightclub in Zillah. He is proposing a similar club in Yakima, also on South First Street but closer to downtown.
She also touched on the recent ruling that the city violated his civil rights. "He's just the classic small business entrepreneur," she said.
Muffett testified that he began studying the adult entertainment business while living in Las Vegas with his now ex-wife. She dances at such clubs, he said, and he spent a lot of time studying the market.
But Harper told the jury that Muffett lacks evidence to show that his proposed business would have been successful.
"We have evidence that he didn't conduct a risk of failure analysis. We have evidence that he didn't know the market and had never done this before," he said. "He won't provide for you any facts or data supporting his presumptions."
Muffett mostly answered questions from his attorney Monday, and further cross examination is expected today before the jury deliberates.
Got something to say?
Start your own discussion
8 comments
Davis thought he had an "angle" in getting around that. Once the city announced it's intention to investigate the matter, Davis told his dancers and other employees that if it does go to court, it will take at least 18 months to work its way through the system, so they were all assured of their jobs for at least that long (an eternity in strip clubdom). On day one (the only day) of the court proceedings, in mid-March 2011 , local Seattle media outlets announced the court's decision early in the morning. I got a text from a (non-Jiggles) dancer at 10:20 a.m. that morning announcing the judge's decision to side with the city of Seattle in the matter.
It looks like Olson's and Davis' estimate of 18 months was "just a bit off the mark." It may have only taken 18 minutes to decide the matter. The club was forced to close the day of the court decision, approximately three months after it opened.
The six-person jury did not award any of the $1.6 million in profits that Jamie Muffett claimed he had lost because of the city’s action.
The city argued that Muffett had only proven about $500 in direct losses for permit fees he paid to the city.
Muffett said he paid for the permits and a lease option on the club location, among other expenses.
The trial started Monday in U.S. District Court in Yakima before Judge Rosanna Peterson. The jury of four men and two women returned the verdict within two hours of the conclusion of final arguments in the case.
Muffett sought to open Sinsations Gentlemen’s Club at 2308 S. First St. in 2010. But the city denied him a license, saying such a business wouldn’t be compatible in the area even though it met zoning requirements.
Earlier this month, Peterson ruled that Muffett’s civil rights had been violated, and that the city needed to be more clear in determining why an adult business wouldn’t be compatible in a given area.
It is quite possible Davis took little to no advice from Olson. If it was her first case of this sort, she may have had a lesson on dealing with this kind of client.
She did come through with some cash on this round though. Proving earnings on a business that never existed is pretty fucking hard.
Next, re-read the last three paragraph's of shadowcat's first post. Muffet failed to adequately demonstrate that he would have had a successful business had he been able to open.